Mark J. Westpfahl (Mayor of South St. Paul, Minnesota, candidate 2024)
Mark J. Westpfahl ran for election to the Mayor of South St. Paul in Minnesota. He was on the ballot in the general election on November 5, 2024.[source]
Westpfahl completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2024. Click here to read the survey answers.
[1]Biography
Mark J. Westpfahl provided the following biographical information via Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey on July 18, 2024:
- Birth date: December 22, 1978
- Birth place: La Crosse,, Wisconsin
- High school: Onalaska High School
- Associate: Western Technical College, 1999
- Bachelor's: University of Minnesota, 2008
- Graduate: University of Minnesota, 2021
- Gender: Male
- Religion: Catholic
- Profession: Educator
- Prior offices held:
- Vice Chair and Treasurer, Inver Grove Heights Board of Education (2012-2015)
- Incumbent officeholder: No
- Campaign slogan: Embracing the Past | Envisioning the Future
- Campaign website
- Campaign Twitter
Elections
General election
General election for Mayor of South St. Paul
Jimmy Francis and Mark J. Westpfahl ran in the general election for Mayor of South St. Paul on November 5, 2024.
Candidate | ||
| Jimmy Francis (Nonpartisan) | ||
 | Mark J. Westpfahl (Nonpartisan)  | |
| ||||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Nonpartisan primary election
Nonpartisan primary for Mayor of South St. Paul
Jimmy Francis, Mark J. Westpfahl, and Eddie Wu ran in the primary for Mayor of South St. Paul on August 13, 2024.
Candidate | ||
| Jimmy Francis (Nonpartisan) | ||
| Mark J. Westpfahl (Nonpartisan) | |
| Eddie Wu (Nonpartisan) | ||
| ||||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Election results
Endorsements
Westpfahl received the following endorsements.
Campaign themes
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Mark J. Westpfahl completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2024. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Westpfahl's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.
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Mark teaches social studies at South Saint Paul Middle School. This is his fourth year in the district and his 15th as a middle school teacher. Mark co-leads the Where Everyone Belongs student leadership program at SSPMS and serves on school leadership committees. He has earned many state and national teaching fellowships and awards.
Mark weaves lessons about the civic process, current events, and local history into his courses when it fits the curriculum. Under his guidance, his students have presented to the school board and city council; taken weeklong trips to Washington, D.C., Boston, and New York; and joined the press corps covering 10 visits by three U.S. presidents.
Over a decade of political and organizational experience has given Mark a strong understanding of the political process, procedures, and policies. He has served on school district and state governmental boards, political committees, and nonprofit boards.- My vision, “Embracing the Past, Envisioning the Future,” focuses on building a prosperous future while honoring our heritage. I bring civic pride, an eagerness to engage multiple perspectives, and governmental experience which I believe will enhance city strengths and address challenges. I aim to foster a vibrant, thriving community where people want to live, work and play. I aim to bring more transparency, collaboration and creativity to city government.
- My priorities include creating a transparent and collaborative environment in which we work with our community partners to develop new strategies for how to combat issues like lowering our incidence of domestic violence and opioid use which is the second highest in Dakota County.
- We need to maintain and repair important infrastructure while finding a balance between taxes and spending. I believe we can be more proactive, rather than reactive, in our decision making and planning processes.
I am eager to help our city enhance policies on economic development, public health, education, and community amenities. Collaborating with local partners, including business leaders, organizations, and elected officials at all levels, is crucial for advancing our collective progress. By leveraging these partnerships, we can equip ourselves with the tools needed to drive our community forward.
An effective leader should possess strong communication, negotiation, and consensus-building skills. Being a quality listener is vital as they will learn new things from residents, business owners and others that will ultimately help craft policies or set strategic initiatives.
Humility is key. An effective leader must recognize that they are not the expert in all matters.
Additionally, the mayor needs to work with the city administrator, other department heads, and the residents of the city to set the strategic vision and plan for the future, and to provide guidance towards policy and initiatives.
Being Mayor of South St. Paul would provide me with an opportunity to serve my community in a way that I talk about on a nearly daily basis in my classroom and in my role as MCSS President. My previous experiences as a school board member and other endeavors would allow me to use expertise and leadership abilities to help grow the future of South St. Paul, while embracing our history. As President of the Minnesota council for the Social Studies, I am a passionate advocate for civic engagement, especially at the local level.
My classroom has always been a place that centers local perspectives in the greater context of Minnesota Studies, American Studies or Global Studies. Those connections provide our young learners with a better understanding of their local community and how interconnected history, geography, and an overall sense of place is formed and valued.
We also need a mayor who is going to actively and effectively work with our community partners, elected officials at all levels, and residents to solicit feedback and ideas for initiatives. Doing this will allow us to better identify gaps and possibilities when reevaluating our goals regarding economic development, public safety, infrastructure, housing, energy and the environment, education, budgets, and more.
Increasing our tax base, while minimizing the rising costs of taxes on residents, when there is little land available for growth. Especially in comparison to our neighboring communities. We need to think creatively on how to maximize our current spaces and encourage businesses to start up or relocate here.
Cost of living continues to increase and we will need to work with partners to keep the cost of renting or owning a house low. South St. Paul should be a welcoming and easy community to move to with as few limitations in place as possible.
As a city, we need to leverage that our current State Representative is on the Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR), a vital position in allocating funding for projects at the state level.
Our current State Senator is the Chair of the Senate Commerce Committee. We need to work with him to help deliver state money to South St. Paul, much as our city official did when former Senator Jim Metzen was able to secure DEED and other grants for our residents.
Like everything else, there should be a balance.
We need to acknowledge that our needs and projects are going to be stacked up against other state legislative needs and we may not be a priority to other legislators that also need to sign off on funding. We can not become dependent on the state to help us fund projects like a new water treatment facility or a new maintenance facility, but we do need to be proactive in our approach and advocacy and we must be prepared to provide a compelling “why this is important for our community” explanation. With that said, we must look for creative ways to fund and finance projects that are deemed priorities.
We also need to work more with our county partners for aid and support.
Our United States Representative was able to secure more than $1,000,000 in Community Project Funding for Prior Lake recently for their trail system. Woodbury was granted $1,500,000 for an Emergency Operations Center Equipment Project. Hastings was awarded $10,500,000 for PFAS and Nitrates Treatment, a problem that we will also be dealing with in South St. Paul.
We should actively and routinely be working with the Congresswoman’s office to advocate for funding for projects that could help secure money for infrastructure repair, maintenance and building of new city facilities, etc.
South St. Paul and West St. Paul have the highest per-capita rate of opioid overdose in Dakota County and one of the highest per-capita rates of opioid overdose in the State of Minnesota. Not only do we need to work with our state legislators and partners at the Minnesota Department of Human Service and their recently formed Opioid Epidemic Response Advisory Council, but we need to work with our federal partners as well to advocate for more money to be allocated in targeted areas such as South St. Paul who are disproportionately affected at alarming levels.
We should be working with our United States Senators to advocate for funding to improve our water supply and to address the growing concerns of PFAS along with high radium levels in our city wells.
I’ve met with Chief Wicke and have the utmost respect for how he oversees the department and what his vision is for the future. We need to make sure that his team is well equipped, trained, and has the tools necessary to respond to different situations.
We also need to be more transparent on the way our decisions are being made. As mayor, I will ask for our city council work sessions to be recorded and minutes available for our public to read. They currently are not, and while votes do not take place during work sessions, most decisions are discussed and agreed upon at these times. This leads to decisions being made in regular council meetings that offer little to no input other than “We discussed this in depth at a work session that is open to the public.”
Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.
See also
2024 Elections
External links
Footnotes
